Lucky
by Iluvbeyblade
Summary: Set during G-Rev. It took a long time and Tala's psychological warfare for Kai to admit that he thought about winning in order to avoid thinking about what he had lost.


I'm ALIIIIIVE! I was literally appalled when I discovered that this is the first oneshot I've published in 2011! WTFF.

Sorry!

It's a bit more subtle than my usual fare, but I hope the main message gets across.

This is set during the Australian leg of G-Rev, before the Kai vs Ray match. Specifically it starts at the end of episode 21 in the dub. XD

Epic thank yous to my amazing pre-readers, **PandaPjays** and **phoenix-shalimar** for giving me their opinions! I've taken pretty much everything you said into account. :)

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><p>The four boys stood and stared at each other's faces over the small plaque. Stood on Ayers Rock they could see for miles, yet none of them were here for the view.<p>

Kai struggled against a sudden sense of deja vu. So much had changed in the past few months, and yet for a single second, it felt like nothing had changed at all. Like any second now they were going to laugh and smile and walk away together to face the next opponent.

But Kai's next opponent was standing next to him, long tail of hair streaming sideways in the wind and hitting Kai's scarf as it too flew backwards.

And Kai's ultimate opponent was standing opposite. Kai fought the full glare of the Australian sun to look straight at that shadowed face and its permanent baseball cap.

So, no. Nothing was the same any more. They were all challengers.

In unison, they turned and walked away in four different directions.

Kai didn't look back once. Not even a twitch in the general direction. So quiet was he that he could hear the world champion's distant humiliation loud and clear when the clumsy idiot slipped on loose stones and slid several feet downwards, swearing loudly and inventively before recovering himself. The faintest idea of a smile softened the edges of Kai's mouth, only to be quickly banished.

He didn't bother responding to the suitably business-like greeting of the driver as he got back into the hideous green four wheel drive thing that had brought him here. He certainly didn't look out of the window.

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The cool rush of the hotel's air conditioning swept over him as he entered. Goosebumps rose on his skin - he took a quick look at his forearms and ground his teeth together at the signs of sunburn. Psychosomatic or simply too much sun; he didn't care. It was hard to ignore and easy to see; _that_ was what he cared about. The arrival of the lift broke his brooding and he stepped into the tiny box, felt his stomach swoop as it lurched up.

With carefully steady hands, he took his keycard from his pocket (it didn't slip an inch; chilled perspiration was sticky and clammy on his palms) and unlocked the door to the Blitzkrieg Boys' suite. The hotel's default air-conditioning had been bracingly cool but the temperature that flew on a blast of air as he opened the door chilled him to the bone. His goosepimples resurfaced, the tugging of hair on skin making his sunburn itch.

Tala was stretched out of the sofa directly opposite the door, asleep. The room was icy, silent and still. This irritated Kai.

"You trying to recreate Russia in here or something?" He felt satisfied as Tala's eyes sprang open and he sat up.

"Fuck off," he replied. His bony white hands twitched; Kai knew that Tala wanted to rub his eyes but that he would never allow even that reaction to show. They eyed each other. "You're sunburnt."

Kai automatically ran his hands lightly over his sore arms, then cursed himself for doing so. "I'll live."

"I'm sure." Tala stood and headed for the kitchen. Kai moved further into the room and closed the door behind him. He shut his eyes for a long moment. The memory of blazing light and heat and three very familiar faces writhed uncomfortably in this opposite environment. His skin itched and stung.

Eventually he joined Tala in the kitchen.

"Spencer and Bryan are down in the bar," Tala said over his shoulder as he stared at the kettle. Kai hadn't asked the question; it annoyed him that he hadn't needed to.

"They'll be no good for practise tonight, then." He sat at the table and wound one hand into his scarf.

"They'll be all right."

"They won't be all right!" Kai clenched his fist and pulled his scarf tight. The boiling kettle shrieked like a banshee. Crockery clunked against cutlery. "Don't they know we need to prepare?" Kai demanded at last. He scowled as Tala sat down opposite him holding two mugs, then pushed one across to him. Kai wasn't so annoyed about Tala knowing this. Sleep just wasted training time, after all.

Steam curled up from the black, sugary coffee, and Kai couldn't help but cup his free hand around it even when the heat hurt.

"We all know we need to prepare for your kitty Chink and his groupies. It's all under control."

Kai didn't react. It took more self-control than he previously thought he had left, but he managed it. He kept his throbbing hand around the mug and remembered his stinging skin, and reminded himself that too much warmth and light would hurt him; burn and blister, scald and rash.

Someone in the room below slammed a door. The sun was starting to sink in the sky. Its colours were striking. The temperature was starting to feel ok; he could relax his muscles without fearing they would quiver with the chill. He raised the mug to his lips and took a quick sip. Almost drinkable temperature.

"Do you know what I read in one of those shitty sports magazines this afternoon?"

Kai hated that tone of voice. It meant Tala had picked up his shovel and was about to pry open your skull.

"No."

"I read that sportsmen are supposed to be highly superstitious." Tala took a long slurp of his drink. "Everything depends on them alone, so they try to shift the responsibility onto some petty little object."

"Mm." Kai could see several ways that Tala could lead this. He didn't like any of them.

"They were giving examples in current sports. You were one of their examples. You and your scarf, to be precise."

"Really." Kai rolled his eyes and drank a little more coffee. Liquid caffeine and sugar, the perfect recipe to prolong waking hours. More time to practise for the upcoming match. It was hot, too, which was good since suddenly the temperature in the room had stopped being bearable. He tried to wind his scarf further round his neck, but something held it down. Confused, he looked down to see his bloodless fingertips poking from the longer end; it had his hand in a chokehold. Hastily he disentangled it.

"Is your scarf your lucky charm, Kai?"

"Does it look like it?" he snapped, waving his strangled hand and flopping fingers.

Tala didn't answer. Kai returned to thinking about his training plan for that evening. There was so much to do. There was a time when he would have known the outcome of this match; when he could have predicted every turn and hit with almost as much accuracy as Kenny. But that was gone now.

Ayers Rock loomed in his mind's eye.

He tried to shift in his chair, but something pinned him down. He glanced down at the table; his hand was enfolded again in the scarf. When had that happened?

God, he was cold.

"Tell me, then, what _is_ your scarf?" Tala drained the last drops from his mug and slammed it down onto the table. Kai almost flinched. Almost. "Because I'm intrigued. You wore it when I first met you two years ago, and you're wearing it now. But you weren't wearing it last year."

The descending Australian sun caught Kai full in the face. He stared at its muted orange centre. Deja vu again. He thought about earlier today, staring the sun in the face and squinting to see their faces.

"Why weren't you wearing it last year?"

Coffee churned in his empty stomach. He looked away from the bright ball sliding down the sky, away from Tala's glacier gaze. The minimalist, monochrome kitchen danced with purple lines and spots.

Afterimages from the sun that faded rapidly into nothing. Nothing and no-one.

He gave Tala an angry look that would have cowed just about anyone else. Still Tala sat there, toying with his empty mug and looking blandly interested.

"Fuck you, Tala!" Kai got up from the table so quickly that he nearly dropped his mostly full mug, and stormed from the room.

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Hours later, he stared into the phantom heat of Dranzer's flames (they were blue now; blue was hotter), mentally exhausted but too keyed up to stop blading.

Tala's voice bounced off the inside of his skull;

_Why weren't you wearing it last year? _

He didn't want to answer, but he hadn't been able to stop thinking about it all evening. He didn't _want_ to think about that one year of feeling comfortable in his own skin. It made him tug his scarf closer around himself to combat the sudden chill.

Closer and closer he brought Dranzer, but as he stood alone on the hotel balcony he got no warmer.

Finally he called it a night. Early morning. Whatever.

The beyblade smacked into his hand and jolted the admission from his thoughts to his lips;

"I didn't need the scarf last year."

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><p>Ok, long AN now. Feel free to skip.<p>

The episode has a massive error in it which I've had pointed out to me by the lovely Panda - the boys appear to go between Ayers Rock and Sydney as though they're next to each other. While I could have rectified this somehow, I chose to ignore it because ... well, because it would have felt like padding, tbh. I wanted this to be short. But just to let you know that even a limey like me now knows that Ayers Rock and Sydney are stupidly far apart.

(Also apologies if me calling it Ayers Rock offends anyone, it's all I've ever heard it called)

I hope that the message of what's upsetting Kai came across ok. :)

All opinions welcome, thank you for reading.

xIlbx


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